


The Broken Lilly Lies

by Narcissus_rose



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Devoted Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Eventual Romance, F/M, Fantasy elements, Fix-It, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Dyad (Star Wars), Grief/Mourning, Happy Ending, Heavy Angst, Inspired by Orpheus and Eurydice (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), One Shot, Post-Canon Fix-It, Post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Rebirth, Reincarnation, Rey Needs A Hug (Star Wars), Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Fix-It, omnipotent beings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:54:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28114983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Narcissus_rose/pseuds/Narcissus_rose
Summary: It has been six months since Ben died and Rey is still unable to move on and forget him. how do you move on from the death of your soulmate? her friends know that something is wrong but don't know how to help her, and she knows that the only person who ever could is gone.a post TROS fix-it that explores grief and hope.I promise that there is a happy ending.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 5
Kudos: 40





	The Broken Lilly Lies

**Author's Note:**

> first of all, I want to say a massive thank you to @TheDinkum_Reylo on Twitter for letting me use this manip as inspiration for this fic, which ended up turning into a labour of love.
> 
> I will be honest, this does have a very personal exploration of grief, and while it started out as a way for me to give these characters a happy ending, it turned out to be far more personal than I had ever intended. I should give a warning that this fic is incredibly heavy on the angst at times and there is a lot of discussion about mourning which, especially this year, might be a bit too close to home for some people, myself included.

Six months.

It had been six months since Exegol and Rey still felt as if she was walking around in a haze. The last thing that she could remember was burying the lightsabers on Tatooine; after that, life began to blur together. Days became harder to tell apart, and the monotonous shape of her life didn’t do much to help. Her friends helped to break the patterns of her dull life, occasionally spending the day together, bringing out a little colour in her dull grey world, but on the whole, the relief was only fleeting.

They knew that something was wrong, but she had refused to tell them what it was. They knew about her grandfather, and they must have thought that he was the root of all her sorrow, because whenever they were all together, Finn and Poe and Rose would all go out of their way not to mention Exegol. That in itself brought some relief, but when they did talk about the war, all the pain came running back. She didn’t have the heart to tell her friends why every time Kylo Ren was mentioned, she would choke back tears, focusing intently on the tiniest thing that she was doing. Focussing on anything but the pain.

_ “I’m picking up my fork. I am now putting the food on my fork. Now I have to bring the food to my mouth. I am now chewing my food. Now I have to swallow. Now I have to swallow. I’m drinking some water. Now I have to swallow my food. Rey, you can do this, you can swallow your food, you’ve eaten through your tears before, and you can do it again. Just swallow the food, Rey!” _ she would think to herself, trying desperately not to focus on what was being said around her.

Finn noticed a change in her whenever Kylo Ren was mentioned, but he never said anything to her about it. The both of them knew that her force signature was filled with only grief whenever his name was mentioned, but she could always feel his hesitancy to ask why. 

She thought that it would all get easier over time, that soon she could pick herself up and maybe find some semblance of happiness with her life, but as the months crept on it soon became clear that that wasn’t the case. How does a person move on with their life when they feel like they are missing half of their soul? How does a person live knowing that it was her destiny to be alone? How does a person live when they feel responsible for the death of the only person who ever really knew them? She would ask herself these questions every night as she lay in bed, wearing the shirt that he left behind.

Sleep was her only refuge.

In her dreams Ben was alive. In her dreams, she would hold him and he would smile at her like he did when they were in the cathedral. In her dreams, they lived in a small house with a boy that looked like him and a girl with his dark hair and her freckles. Some nights it felt less like a dream and more like a memory when he would hold her. Those nights were always the hardest to wake up from. 

Whenever she did wake up from those, tears always followed.

Rey sat in her home on Coruscant, looking out the window watching the sunset over the endless towers and skyscrapers, imagining the lives of all the people that lived in them, wondering if there was anyone else who felt as if a piece of them was missing. She knew if there was, that they didn’t feel it as deeply as her. There wasn’t a soul in the galaxy that hadn’t been touched by the war in some way, and she knew that it was wrong to measure her grief against theirs, but in some sick way, she found some pleasure in believing that hers was worse. 

She had already had dinner that evening with her friends so she found herself at a loss as to what to do. She couldn’t go onto the holonet because all they would be talking about was the six month anniversary, and she couldn’t face the reminder. Instead, she decided to do what she did every time she found herself wishing she wasn’t so alone.

In her wardrobe, there was a small box that sat in the corner, filled with a variety of items, from nondescript black clothing that she stole from the Finalizer when troops and possessions were being offloaded, to a picture that once belonged to General Leia. To an outsider, there would be nothing of note, but to Rey, they were the most precious things in the galaxy. As she opened the box the smell of sandalwood and embers washed over her, filling her senses and for just a moment Ben was with her. 

For a moment, he had his arms lovingly wrapped around her.

When she opened her eyes, that moment ended and all she was left with was a box of clothes, a picture, and a hollow feeling in her chest. These items weren’t Ben no matter how much she wished them to be.

And oh how she wished them to be.

“Hello, Ben,” she said as she held the small picture of him from when he was a child that Leia kept hidden away in a drawer so none of the other members of the Resistance would find it, “I know I haven’t talked to you in a while and it’s not because I haven’t needed you, but I just haven’t had the strength to do it. Today I really need you with me, even if it’s just this box of you. I can’t believe it’s six months since you— since y-you—” she couldn’t finish the rest of the sentence as she broke down in tears.

“I need you, Ben!” she all but shouted at the picture of him at fifteen, unaware of what cruelties the future would hold for him, “I need you here with me, I don’t want to be alone like this anymore. You were the only person in the galaxy who understood me and was as lonely as I was. When I was with you I wasn’t lonely, even when you weren’t around I could still feel you, but now I can’t and it feels like a piece of me is gone. I want that piece back so I can hold it and never let it go.” Her voice was shaking and hoarse from shouting and pleading with a ghost, “I- I love you, Ben,” she whispered. Rey had never uttered those words before; not to her friends, not to her parents, only Ben, and he wasn’t around to hear it. Another sob ripped through her body at the realization as she knelt on the floor, gasping for air, all alone in her grief.

It was as she knelt there, body hunched over itself when she felt a shift in the force. She couldn’t quite put her finger on what that shift was, other than it felt familiar and warm, like a blanket on a cold night. She put Ben’s possessions back into the box and tucked them away, as the tears dried on her face, letting his smell fade away until it was nothing more than a memory. Strangely enough, she found herself feeling better after speaking to him; the loneliness persisted, but she felt better than when she usually spoke to him like a weight had been lifted from her chest.

She hoped to go about the rest of her evening feeling a semblance of peace, but not long after her crying settled down, a headache pierced its way through her skull, as though someone was digging through her mind. This wasn’t like the headaches she got once she had finished crying, this was more brutal and punishing. She had hoped that she could fall asleep and have it gone by morning, but in her dreams, she was only met with the cruel laugh of her grandfather, and the sight of Ben’s body falling to the ground.

For the next few weeks, she continued to feel that strange shift in the force, desperately trying to place the familiarity that came along with it. She liked to imagine that it was Ben, reaching out to her, finally making good on his promise that she wouldn’t be alone, but she knew that that wasn’t the case. Ben’s force signature, while warm, always had a strong presence about it that was so uniquely him. Even when he embraced the light, that strength was still there, and even after he was gone, as he spoke his last words to her, she felt it. She knew that she wasn’t feeling Ben, but it still helped her to imagine that it was him.

She even asked Finn if he had felt the shift, but he only looked at her, puzzled, having no idea what she was talking about. He suggested that she look through some of the Jedi texts, or visit the old temple to see if there was anything there that explained this feeling. She already knew that nothing there would.

Instead, she continued to walk around in her foggy haze, letting the days blend into one around her, but unlike before, sleep no longer provided the respite it used to. Now she was plagued with dreams of Exegol and visions of the cliffs of the Ach-to and its ocean. She wasn’t sure what it all meant; normal dreams usually consisted of her and Ben being happy together, not this strange sense of foreboding.

On the occasions when she did see Ben in her dreams, he was always sad and kept his distance from her. She always reached out to him but he would move away to avoid touching her, like doing so would hurt him in some way. Every time he did she wanted to cry out and beg him to hold her, because where else would she have the opportunity? In the waking world, he was only now a memory that she desperately clung to, but in her dreams, she could pretend. In her dreams she had closure. 

One day, she came home to her apartment after a meeting with Poe on how to rebuild the republic, when she felt another presence there with her. She knew that it wasn’t one of her friends, and she began to panic, remembering a similar time when a scavenger had walked into her fallen AT-AT and made himself comfortable while she was out scavenging. She managed to scare him off, but after that, she had left traps in the surrounding area to stop any other curious scavengers from encroaching on her pocket of safety in that desolate landscape. 

“Who's there?” she asked as she heard footsteps in the kitchen which went woefully underused, from both not knowing how to cook and no desire to learn to do so. She began clutching the staff in her hand just that bit tighter, fearing the intruder would try and hurt her. Slowly, she rounded the corner into the living room, only to see a man sitting on the couch with a broad frame and dark hair. As he turned around she realized that she recognized that aquiline nose and soulful eyes. In her dreams, she had mapped every mole on that face as if it was a constellation or star chart, guiding her back to him.

“Ben,” she whispered as he looked back at her smiling. 

“Rey,” he whispered, standing up holding his hand out to her. The moment she took his hand he pulled her into his chest and they just held each other as closely as possible, while Rey sobbed tears of joy into his shirt, soaking it through. 

She didn’t care how he was there, only that he was.

“I’ve missed you,” she said as the tears ebbed and she pushed away from his body slightly so she could look up at him.

“I know,” he said as he kissed the top of her head. Looking up at him, Rey noticed how his smile shifted from jubilation to sadness, “if only this were real.”

That was when Rey felt her heart shatter.

“What?” she trembled as tears began to form in his eyes.

“This isn’t real Rey,” he choked out, “you're still asleep. I’m just a memory, like the picture of a boy long gone from this galaxy, but one you so desperately hold on to because you can’t face crying over the cold stare of the supreme leader or the empty smile of a twenty-one-year-old Jedi. No, you want Ben Solo, the last time he was happy.”

He took his thumb and wiped away a tear that was streaming down her face; she didn’t even realize that she was leaning into his touch. It made sense looking back, her walking straight through the couch into his arms and the winding corridors from the entrance to the living room that didn’t exist in real life. Of course, he wouldn’t be there when he had been dead for nine months.

“I’m not completely lost though,” he said, making her only cry harder. She didn’t have the heart for her subconscious to tell her that nobody was ever really gone and that she would always carry him with her. She knew that she would always carry that empty space in her soul for the rest of her life, “you can still find me. You won’t have to spend the rest of your life wrapping your arms around yourself at night and pretend it’s me holding you, and you won’t have to tell a picture, how your day was and pretend I’m listening.”

“How?” She whispered, holding on to the front of his shirt.

“She will show you,” he said, pointing to something behind her. She whipped her head around to see what he was pointing at, only to find when she did that she was no longer in her apartment, instead, she found herself in a golden room with arched mirrors lining the walls. Above her chandeliers of crystal and diamond were suspended from an arched ceiling that was covered in paintings that appeared to be depicting dramatic scenes of life and death.

As the room glistened around her, she looked back, only to find that Ben was gone. In his place she saw a woman dressed in blood-red robes, flowing around her body as if it was water in a stream, sitting on a throne of equal splendour to match the room around her. She was young, yet carried herself in a way that let people know that she was as cruel as she was beautiful, and would not hesitate in cutting someone down to size. 

“Rey,” she said, her voice as soft as velvet, “you have probably figured out by now that this is no ordinary dream you are having.” Rey could only nod as she felt a million questions at the tip of her tongue.

“Who are you?” She asked.

“I am of the force, and that is all you need to know,” she said calmly, voice sounding more mature than her first youthful lilt, “I can see that you have many questions so I shall now do my best to answer them. That shift you felt in the force was me, and yes I am the one responsible for your dreams ever since you admitted your love for Ben Solo.”

“Why?” Rey blurted out.

“Because he isn’t dead,” that was when Rey felt her weld crumble around her. How could he be alive? Was that why she could never reach out to him? If he was alive why hadn’t he reached out before she gave up reaching for him? 

“When one half of a Dyad dies before their time,” she continued, her stare as cold as ice, and now as Rey looked more closely, cheeks that had grown more hollow and lines forming around her eyes, as if she was ageing, “the one left alive is cursed to live the rest of their life in agony, missing half of their soul. The whole point of a Dyad is to bring balance to the galaxy, with one drawing more from the dark and one drawing more from the light, so when one is lost the force is thrown into a great imbalance. They will either blind themselves with light to try and forget or immerse themselves in darkness to bring them back. To stop this from happening, the force can find itself being rather generous with the laws of nature.” As the woman spoke Rey felt hope bubbling up within her that she tried to suppress for fear of disappointment, “you, Rey, have an opportunity to bring back Ben.”

“No,” Rey said, unable to stop the words from falling out of her mouth in a mixture of grief and disbelief, “no, no, no… how do I know if I can trust you? Why wouldn’t you tell me this before, why wait until now? Why wouldn’t you let me save Ben Solo sooner?” She roared, fighting tears.

“Because you weren't ready,” she said cooley, although her voice had now grown raspy and her dark hair was showing grey at her roots, “for months afterward you were in complete denial about what he meant to you, and it was only when you admitted that you loved him that it was clear that you were ready.”

“So a man's life hangs in the balance all because I have to admit how I feel about him?”

“No Rey, his life hangs in the balance because the force was unsure of whether or not you would seek out other means of bringing him back. When you admitted you love him it was clear that there was a possibility of you turning to the dark side to bring him back. If this were to happen there is a very good chance that you would have gone darker than your grandfather ever went.” The mention of her grandfather sent a chill down her spine, as well as the frank way she spoke of her darkness. 

“How do I find him,” she asked cautiously, worried that after snapping at the now frail figure, she had now ruined her chance at possibly saving Ben.

“Follow your dreams,” she said, looking now more like a withered old woman than the young beauty she was before. Rey wasn't sure what she meant by ‘follow your dreams,’ but she was sure that she didn't mean it in the colloquial sense. 

Rey was going to ask what she meant, but the woman's eyes had sunken and her hair was little more than a few strands upon her head, with fingers spindle like a spider's leg. It was at that moment, the windows of the room flew open, sending in a gust of air through the hall, blowing past the goddess (for that's what Rey was sure she was), disintegrating her into a cloud of dust.

**_Find him,_ ** a voice whispered as the room around her began to crumble into dust.

Rey woke with a start, sweat dripping down her brow, mixing with the tears she shed in her sleep and her heart racing. She immediately pulled back the covers and raced to the window to see that dawn was breaking over the Coruscant skyline. Rey was thinking over everything that the woman said to her, when she began to think of her dreams of the past, how she was constantly shown visions of Exegol and Ach-to. 

That was when she realized that she already had the answer: she had to go to Ach-to.

* * *

It had taken a while to convince her friends to let her go instead of staying and reviving a dead religion while they rebuilt the republic, but eventually, they conceded. They were ultimately worried that she would go and isolate herself from the rest of the galaxy and live like a hermit. Poe was even so worried that he watched her fill the Falcon with fuel so he knew that she had enough to get her there and back. They may have clashed in the past, but that didn’t stop him from worrying about her.

She knew that they meant well, and given her reluctance to even leave her bed some days, she could understand their caution in the face of her sudden enthusiasm for a trip. Because of this, she felt bad for not telling them why she had to go, other than to ‘right some wrongs,’ as she had put it. She felt bad going into small shops where nobody would recognize her, as she searched for clothes that would be roughly Ben’s size, and not being able to tell anyone why.

Even as she prepared for Ben to return to her, she did so with trepidation, not allowing herself to get her hopes up, only to watch him die before her, as he did on Exegol. She didn’t know if she could bear losing him a second time.

She had been instructed by Rose to contact her before she went to sleep each night so they knew that she was okay. It still felt odd to Rey that someone would care about her well-being in that way, even though Rey wasn’t sure if her friends would ever look at her the same way if she managed to bring Ben back.

As she prepared to take off, she wondered what she would have to do to bring him back, if it would involve some kind of trial or series of labours for her to complete, to prove her worth to some celestial body. Either way, she knew that if she were to fail, she was unsure of what she would do. 

She was worried that she had just said a final goodbye to her friends without them even knowing.

The first few days of her journey were mostly uneventful, and she spent most of her time flying, making stops on nearby planets where she could rest, before taking off again the next day. That did extend the journey, but it was the price to be paid for not having a copilot. Poe had offered to go with her, but she told him that it was something that she needed to do on her own. She spoke to them quite a bit, keeping them updated on her whereabouts and how she was doing, but in the evenings, she sat in the captain's quarters, holding the picture of Ben, telling it that she was coming for him.

“Hang on a bit longer,” she told the picture as she clutched it in shaking hands, “hang on for me Ben, I’m coming, just give me time.” That was when she felt the force shift around her.

There was the Faintest feeling of arms being wrapped around her, holding her in a warm embrace. She knew that there was nobody there, but for a moment she closed her eyes and imagined that somebody was sitting on the floor with her, holding her tenderly. She didn’t let her imagination wander any further than that though; she wasn’t sure she could take the disappointment if she was wrong; when she was wrong. But against her better judgment, she still pretended that it was Ben holding her.

Eventually, the feeling slowly faded away, but not before she could whisper, “I love you,” to the phantom arms that left her body.

* * *

“I love you too.”

* * *

Stepping off the Falcon, she was immediately met with the cold sea breeze and ocean mist blowing in her face. Not far off she could see the ashes of Ben’s TIE that she burned when she thought that she would just live the rest of her life on that island. The sight filled her with regret, wishing that she had taken up his offer and gone with him, maybe that way he would be there with her and she wouldn’t be trying to cheat death.

The first thing she did was make the trek up to the precipice where Luke had made her meditate when he had told her to reach out. Climbing the stairs her legs began to burn and she realized just how inactive she had been these nine months, preferring to hide away from the rest of the galaxy than live her usual active life.

Once she reached the rock, she sat down cross-legged and began to reach out. At first, she couldn’t feel anything other than the usual hum of the force, but after a while, she felt a shiver run down her back, and a chill spread over her body. It was then she realized where she had to go.

The first time she found herself at the mouth of the cave she had been searching for answers, about her parents and herself, but in the end, she saw nothing but her own reflection. Now as she stood at the entrance, looking over the vines crawling out of the entrance, she worried that she was mistaken and she would, once again, find nothing. As she stood there she could see something small floating up from within; she tried to get a better look at what it was as it rose, and she soon realized that it was a butterfly.

A blue butterfly.

For a brief moment, it fluttered around her head before flying off into the hills of Ach-to. That small creature awakened Rey to a feeling that she thought was long lost to her. Hope. Just that butterfly gave her hope that she could find Ben.

She leapt off the ledge, into the freezing water beneath her. Once she had reached the water’s edge, she came face to face with a small purple flower with pointed petals. She had seen one of those before once when she was on a small mission with Rose when she had told Rey that it was called a bellflower. Pulling herself out of the water, she saw another butterfly landing on the flower. In fact, the cave was covered in flowers, from the floor to its ceiling, in pink Honeysuckle, Sweet-Brier, and Jasmine, with little Lotuses floating on the water's surface.

As she walked through she could see that all the life in the cave was focused around the mirror, and it even looked like the butterflies were flying out from its surface. She stopped in front of it and gently pressed the pads of her fingers against what she expected to be cold hard glass. Instead, she found that it was like a waterfall, parting away from her fingers. She pressed her hand further in and met no resistance, so she began to step forward until the safety of the cave was behind her and she was within the mirror.

She looked out into the distance and saw only the signs of death around her. On the ground, there were flowers similar to the ones in the cave, but they looked half-dead or close to dying, along with trees that appeared to be in a similar state. Above her hung a single moon, against a black sky, missing any stars or nebulae that would be expected. Behind her, she could see through the other side of the mirror but ahead was only decay. She began to walk forward where she saw a figure, clad in black crouching on the ground.

She felt her heart jump and before she knew it she was running towards it. She desperately wanted to call out his name, as she ran towards him, but there was a part of her that was still afraid that the figure would look up and it wouldn’t be him.

When the figure did look up, she was confronted with an angular face with plush red lips that contrasted against his pale skin and dark hair. He looked up at her and all her fears melted away, leaving only a feeling of pure joy.

She had found Ben.

The moment their eyes met Ben looked at her with what could only be described as pure happiness, as he got up and ran towards her.

“Ben!” She called out, the tears now running freely down her face, only for once it wasn’t because of grief. 

The moment they met in the middle, they crashed into each other’s arms, clutching each other as tightly as possible, as if they were afraid of losing each other again. They were both crying and laughing and holding each other, and Rey knew without a doubt that this was the happiest moment of her life.

“Rey,” he said as he stroked her cheek, “you’re here? It’s you, it's really you?”

“Of course,” she said, “I’ll always find you,” and with that, once again she kissed him, savouring the feeling of his lips pressed against hers, soft and warm and real.

Eventually, they pulled away, and she began to guide him back to the mirror’s edge, holding his hand more tightly than was comfortable, although he didn’t seem to mind. She went first stepping through the mirror, feeling it part around her as she held onto Ben, pulling him through with her. As they stepped onto the other side, Rey was suddenly overwhelmed with a feeling that she hadn’t had since Exegol.

Slowly Rey began to feel the bond coming back to life, and with it, she felt a piece of herself return. She turned to Ben to share her elation with him, but when she looked up at him, she saw him staring out at the scene before them in wonder. He took in the sight of the flowers and butterflies like they were the most beautiful things in the world, and Rey supposed that to him they were. Sunlight was now streaming through the opening of the cave, onto the water below, reflecting against the walls, creating the illusion that the walls were covered in diamonds.

He took a step forward and then collapsed onto his knees and began to cry, although it was not because of grief. With the bond now alive, Rey could feel his happiness to be back after being stuck in that purgatory that she had just freed him from. Without realizing it, he sent her images of him desperately trying to break through the mirror, for nine months, to no avail. Now as he clutched the flowers in his hands he knew that it was real.

He knew he was free.

“How long have I been gone?” He asked, his voice hoarse from either his current tears or months of disuse.

“Nine months,” she said as he stood up and turned to face her, his eyes red, but a hopeful smile still lingered on his lips.

“Sometimes I could see you,” he said, “you couldn’t feel me, but I would see you crying and I would try and comfort you. I think I did that more for my benefit than yours.” That was when Rey realized a truth that she did not dare let herself believe.

“I felt you,” she said, as tears threatened to fall again as she remembered all of the lonely nights when she thought that she could feel someone holding her hand, or arms wrapped around her as she held the likeness of her love onboard the Millennium Falcon as she travelled to Ach-to, “I could feel you but I was too afraid to let myself hope that it was you.” he was close now and Rey could feel his breath against her face as her heart began to race. He reached over to take her hand, and even that small act set her body alight, burning with love and a need to keep him close and never let go.

“Rey,” his voice was no more than a whisper now and they were so close that their faces were only a hair's breadth away, “I never got the chance to tell you…”

“Tell me what?” she asked as his voice trailed off and she searched his eyes, finding only tenderness.

“Every day while in that limbo, as hours felt like months and a day would feel like only a heartbeat, when I began to question why I was even there, I would remember that it was for you. It was always for you Rey because no matter how much I told myself otherwise after you turned me down, you have always been the most important thing in my life. I knew that as long as you had a chance to see the galaxy and be happy, then that was all that mattered because, at the end of it all, I love you, Rey.” That was all the reassurance that Rey needed, knowing that for once, there was someone in the galaxy so loved her.

“I love you too. Nothing, not even death can stop me from loving you.”

She wasn't sure how it happened, but the next thing she knew, Ben's lips were pressed to hers and she felt herself melt into his arms as he supported her. She could feel the tears running down their cheeks, mixing with the taste of his lips and the warmth of his skin. 

For the first time in so long, Rey could say that she was happy.   
  


* * *

Eventually, when they got back to the Falcon, Rey was bombarded with dozens of missed messages from her friends, all worried that something bad had happened to her. She looked at the dates when the messages were sent and they all read from three days ago.

_ Three days ago?  _ Rey thought to herself as she went through them. She began to wonder if she had missed her friends’ attempts to contact her when she was travelling but she looked at the date and realized that it had been three days. A journey that had only taken ten minutes ended up lasting for three days.

She immediately went about responding to them, quelling any fears they had, telling them that she had gone into such a deep meditation that she hadn’t even noticed how much time had gone by. She didn’t think that she was ready to tell them the truth just yet. First, she wanted to spend some time with Ben, helping him adjust to the living world and try filling him in on everything that’s been going on. At the moment, he was sleeping outside, enjoying the feeling of the wind on his face and the fresh sea air as the sound of waves crashing against the cliffs lulled him into rest.

Now and then she would reach out into the force and just feel him, and reassure herself that he was actually there. As she sat in the cockpit of the Falcon, she noticed a light blinking, alerting her that someone was trying to talk to her. She was wary about opening it, but she also didn’t want them to think that she had been hurt after her ‘meditation’ and prompt them to fly over to her. With trepidation she answered the call, finding herself talking to Finn.

_ “Rey, are you alright?”  _ He asked, his voice filled with concern.

“I’m fine,” she responded, trying to keep her expression as neutral as possible.

_ “Rey, I know that’s not true. For three days your force signature was gone. It wasn’t like when you…” _ he trailed off, not wanting to bring up all the pain of Exegol,  _ “it wasn’t like that. It was like you disappeared like you didn’t exist anymore. I didn’t tell the others because I didn’t want them to jump to any conclusions, but Rey you have to know how worried we were. What happened?” _

“Finn,” she said eventually, “I’ll probably be here for a few more days, maybe a week, but when I get back things may be a little different.” She glanced out the window and saw Ben had woken up and was now walking around looking at the landscape, “something did happen to me but it’s hard to explain here. It’s nothing bad, in fact, I think this is the happiest I’ve been in a long time, but explaining it to you like this would feel wrong. It needs to be in person.”

_ “Alright,”  _ he said,  _ “just know that we’re here for you and we’re all glad you're safe.” _ With that, he signed off, and Rey was left watching Ben, revelling in being alive.

They spent a few extra days on Ach-to, enjoying their time alone together, and letting Ben adjust to life. She was surprised how comfortable he was being on the Falcon, given all the history attached to that ship. When she asked him about it, he mumbled something about having all the forgiveness he needed. She assumed that it was a reference to something that may have happened when he was in that world between worlds, but she thought it best to leave it be for the time being, and let him tell her when he was ready.

When the time came to leave, Rey was worried about so much; how her friends would react, how Ben would fit into this new world, where she would fit into this new world, knowing that the life others imagined for her wasn’t the one she wanted to lead. Clearly, the trepidation was rolling off her in waves because as she began the takeoff sequence, she felt a strong hand rest on hers, reassuring her that it would all be alright. That was when she knew that no matter what may happen, as long as they had each other, they would find their way.

* * *

**twenty years later**

The wind outside was relentless as the trees blew in the wind, sometimes hitting the roof, sending a jolt through the house. Rey had done her best to try and settle down Kleio, hoping that she had fallen asleep before the wind had picked up to its current state, although she knew that all her children were light sleepers, so it was unlikely. 

“How long should we give it,” Ben mumbled into her neck as he wrapped his body around hers, “until we feel someone climb in with us?” 

“Probably the next time a branch hits the roof,” Rey pondered sleepily. Much like she had predicted, not long after a branch made a loud thud against the roof, the sound of footsteps could be heard approaching their bed and climbing up to settle next to Rey. She pulled back the covers and pulled her five-year-old daughter close, kissing her on the head and got ready to settle down.

“Mommy,” Kleio whispered as she cuddled closer to her mother, “I’m scared. The wind’s too loud and I can’t sleep.”

“That’s alright sweetheart,” she said, “your daddy and I are right here and we won’t let anything happen to you.”

“Ok,” she whispered back and appeared to settle down, soothed by her mother’s words. For a little while, it seemed that she would settle down and sleep until another gust of wind blew past and startled Kleio. She had been nervy ever since the storm managed to knock down a tree in their neighbour’s yard, and from that point onward, she had been afraid that a tree would fall through the roof. That was the one downside of living on Naboo, the winter storms.

Briefly, Rey reached out into the force to see if her other children were still awake or were woken up when she heard a soft knock at the door.

“Mom, Dad, I can’t sleep,” Aurora said as she walked in and crawled into bed next to her sister.

“Is your brother awake?” Ben asked as he shuffled back to make room for the four of them.

“Yeah.”

“Daddy, can you read, please?” Kleio asked, getting agreement from her sister, “it would help us sleep.”

Ben grumbled something about it being a school night, but still turned on the lights and called the book that sat on the little shelf in the corner of the room to his hand. 

The books were something that Ben had started not long after returning to Rey. The initial reaction to his return was not all positive, and Ben needed to find a way to busy himself in a way that the general populace deemed as mostly harmless. After some deliberation, Ben was assigned to the Archives to organize years’ worth of books and holos. Poe had thought that it would be a punishment, making him spend his days underground, unearthing over fifty years worth of dust, but as it turned out he found that he had enjoyed the work, much to Poe's annoyance.

None of her friends had been overly enthusiastic with his return, but over time they had warmed to him. At first, it was out of their love for Rey, wanting to see her happy, but after a while, they came to love Ben in his own right, and not just because he made their friend happy. Rose had been the first to come around, shaking his hand when Rey first introduced them, like there wasn’t a war's worth of tension between them. Finn and Poe had taken more time, with the latter still convinced that he was the monster they had all painted him out to be, but eventually, all it took was time, alcohol, and an opportunity to reminisce over the past that brought them together. 

After Poe had deemed that Ben’s punishment was over and he was allowed to leave the archives, Ben had begun writing. After his time going through the history of the galaxy, he realized how big an impact his family had in shaping it, but he also realized how little was known about them as people. They had both discussed having children and knew that they wanted a family, and from that Ben began to write his family history like it was a fairytale, so that one day they could explain to their children where they come from, but also soften the blow of some very difficult truths for even an adult to come to terms with. 

“Jason,” Ben called out, “do you want to come in here and join us?”

“No,” the thirteen-year-old shot back, prompting Kleio to jump out of bed and drag her brother out of his room to join them. He shuffled in and took a place next to his father on the bed, ready to listen to a story he had heard many times before, “Which one is it?”

“Your favourite, number five,” Ben said as he opened the book.

Rey took a moment to appreciate the scene around her. So many times in her life she thought that something like this was not possible for her, but here she was, age forty with her thirteen, ten and five-year-old children, sitting in bed as her husband read to them to comfort them in a storm. Briefly, she felt Ben use the bond to brush lovingly against her mind, sharing her sentiments, before he began to read

“A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…”

  
  


  
  


**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading.
> 
> A fun little FYI: the names of the children were all taken from Greek mythology, with Kleio being the muse of history and epic poetry, Aurora being the goddess of the morning and Jason being the hero of the Argo. also, the room where the goddess (based on the ghost of Christmas present) speaks to Rey is based on the hall of mirrors at the Palace of Versailles.
> 
> the title is also based on a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelly called Adonias


End file.
